(Apologies, of course, if you are a professional model or a professional athlete. If you are, you can stop reading here.)

I have two things I want you guys to read and think about today. The first is pulled from a transcript of The Paleo Solution Podcast, number 167. A listener asked Robb Wolf and Greg Everett whether they thought a person’s body had some ideal composition point beyond which it could not improve. Greg replied, in part:

And the last one I would add to that is make sure when you’re doing your evaluations you’re comparing yourself to yourself. If you try to evaluate your worth as a human being by comparing yourself to elite athletes especially to their body composition, you’re going to be in for a really long miserable life because not only are these guys the cream of the crop genetically speaking and I know this is bursting a lot of people’s bubbles. Most of them are on drugs of some kind so you gotta just relax.

Greg, in case you don’t know, has credibility when it comes to the whole body composition and athletics sort of thing:

Okay, so keep all that in the back of your mind. Now read what else he has to say in that podcast:

Someone posted on our Twitter it was like Lance Armstrong proved you can use steroids and still be healthy. No, what he proved is how naïve the general public is about PED’s. That’s what proves is people were actually surprised about that?

(PEDs = performance enhancing drugs)

Let that sink in a bit and then, let’s move on to the next piece I wanted to share with you. It’s from Chris Kresser‘s blog article “Do fat people live longer?” First, after explaining the serious and notable limitations of reliance on BMI (look for a blog post on BMI from me soon), and after reviewing a few key studies, he concludes:

These studies all have their limitations, but the general pattern seems to suggest that a slightly higher BMI with a higher proportion of lean mass is associated with better mortality outcomes for both men and women. For women specifically, healthily distributed body fat is actually protective against mortality, even at higher levels. There are several explanations for this finding, including a greater caloric reserve during catabolic illness, overall greater muscle strength, and possibly a more adequate food intake, particularly for older adults.

The added emphasis is mine. He goes on to say:

It’s important to remember that a person’s body fat may increase for a variety of reasons, and that BMI is a poor indicator of overall health in most cases. As a clinician, I believe certain indicators of health such as insulin sensitivity, markers of inflammation, and overall digestive function are far more important predictors of health than BMI or total body weight. If you’re a metabolically healthy person with a few extra pounds that just won’t budge, current evidence suggests that getting to your “perfect” weight may not increase your lifespan. In fact, if you’re a woman, it may even be counterproductive. This casts doubt – at least from a scientific perspective — on our culture’s (pathological?) obsession with skinniness. It also suggests that maintaining adequate lean body mass by eating a nutrient-dense diet and doing regular weight-bearing exercise may be more important than shaving off those final few pounds of fat.

Again, the added emphasis is mine.

These comments from Everett and Kresser really crystallized some thoughts I have had around the issue of social and personal expectation when it comes to “wellness” and what it means to be healthy.

But this all leads me to a deeper question, and that’s why we feel so compelled to think of ourselves as “athletes?” Why can’t we just go out there, move our bodies, and have fun? Similarly, why do we think we need to be rail-thin and spend our lives in deprivation because we are women of a certain age?

I keep coming to the same answer, and it’s one that plagues me more and more the older I get.

My friend Carmen of Mindful Health and Wellness asked on her Facebook page the other day what obstacles people felt they faced that kept them from eating a real food diet. Not surprisingly, the common refrain was lack of time. But here’s the thing … are we really too pressed for time to serve ourselves and our families real, whole food? Or, have the food manufacturers, fast food outlets and marketers just convinced us that we are?

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4 Responses to “You Are Not a Professional Model. You are Not a Professional Athlete.”

Well, AMEN to this post! I am amazed at the women I work with in my clothing business that have such a bad self image and it really makes me sad. I was dressing a woman last night who was a perfect size 10, very fit and healthy, but at the same time complaining about her size. Who decided that we all needed to be a size 2 to be beautiful? I want to start a new movement that says, “Be Healthy and Happy with your size!” God made some of lean and long and others of us short and round. I wish we could all embrace our bodies that we were born with and quit wishing we look like the emaciated models who are not always so healthy.
I also think FUN is a big part of exercise, Kristine! If it becomes HARD WORK all the time, we will quit. I have found a group of 4 women my age that work out together and we just have a great time sharing and laughing with each other. We must learn how to be healthy and fit without obsessing about the perfect body! I have a feeling your classes have some FUN involved and I wish I lived close enough to come to some of them.
Thank you for writing these posts…….what a blessing they have been for me!